


Bravery is a Lot of Things

by coldfiredragon



Series: Because You Made Me Brave [1]
Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Eliot is saved, F/M, Future Fic, M/M, Personal Growth, bravery is a lot of things, but he doesn't get his happy ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-17
Updated: 2019-04-17
Packaged: 2020-01-15 12:36:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,212
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18499111
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coldfiredragon/pseuds/coldfiredragon
Summary: For Eliot, bravery means picking up the pieces and accepting that he deserves better than being someone's second choice.





	Bravery is a Lot of Things

**Author's Note:**

> I wanted to post this before the finale, so the second half is a little rougher than I'd planned. El is a mess of emotions, so hopefully it reads well. Enjoy.

Trapped in his happy place the idea of being brave had been to tell Quentin that he wanted to try, that he'd grown and was ready, and when he finally got out he'd taken the chance. Quentin's face had been hovering over him when he'd woken up, and Eliot had reached for him. The grip on his neck was so familiar, the press of their lips was intimate, like coming home. 

“I love you; I want to try. Peaches and plums, Q. Please let me try.” Quentin had stiffened under his hand, not at all the way Eliot had hoped and he'd glanced to his left. To Alice, who looked just about as shocked as Eliot felt. It was the first year and the emotion bottles all over again. Her face went hard and closed off, Quentin sputtered to find words and Eliot suddenly couldn't be there. He'd scooted backward and stood, or tried to stand, and the damage the Monster had done to his body, combined with the shock of being too late hit him like a one, two, punch. The world had spun; he'd blacked out. 

When he came around again, they had moved him to one of the beds of a lux but unfamiliar apartment. Both Margo and Q were there, and Bambi had launched herself into his embrace. 

“Do that to me again, and I'll kill you myself.” He'd laughed, a weak choke of a sound, and cradled her with his face buried against her shoulder, so he didn't have to look at anything, or anyone else. Being brave was knowing how to take a hint and accept that he'd been passed over. It left a bitter taste in his mouth. He'd spent months in his mind preparing for a reunion and lifetime that had lasted for the duration of a sentence. 

Quentin's hand had pressed to his shoulder, and he'd flinched.

“El...” The syllable was broken, and Eliot had lifted his head to look at him. The conflicted look on Quentin's face had made something go hard inside of him. He couldn't do this again, be the third point in a love triangle. How was that fair after fifty fucking years? Didn't he deserve to the first choice, the only choice, this time around? 

“I can't... I can't do it again. _I love you, Quentin._ , My whole heart, my soul, belong to you. I love you so much that I can't share you again. I can't live through another polyamorous relationship again.” It was harsh, utterly cruel, and heart-breaking, but at the time Eliot had felt how weak his body was and he hadn't been able to summon the energy and patience he knew it would take to share. 

“El.” 

“How is it a contest?” The words had come out almost shrill. Margo's arms had tightened around him.

“I love you.” Eliot had sensed the but 

“Just not one hundred percent.” 

“It's complicated!” 

“Pussy up, Quentin!” Margo had snapped. 

“Stay out of this, Bambi!” Eliot had wished she weren't there. 

Being brave had been realizing that he doesn't have to accept that he's someone's second choice. Being brave had been admitting that he has no one to blame but himself. Being brave was understanding that Quentin needed to do what was healthy, and the healthy thing was to find someone who wanted him after the person he had asked to want him had said no.

“It's complicated, El.” Quentin had tried again. 

“No, it's not. Alice betrayed us, Quentin! I died for one of those keys.” 

“I had to bury you.” 

“I wish I'd stayed in the ground.” Eliot had rubbed the heel of his hand against his eye socket. His stomach had gurgled between hunger and nausea. He'd needed to eat, but he'd known he wouldn't be able to keep anything down. Beside him, Margo had made a distressed little noise.

“Can we not do this now?” She clearly hadn't been comfortable with the tangent his mind had gone down. 

“No. I wish we'd never come back to the present; I wish I'd died in Fillory. In the past was the only place where I've ever been happy, and my life worked.” Eliot hadn't been sure where the line for suicidal ideation fell. He hadn't wanted to hurt himself, at least he didn't think he had, but when he'd looked at the path that was unfolding before him, he hadn't seen much to be hopeful or grateful about. 

Being brave had involved figuring out how to live his life without being a king, without Fillory, because going back to Fillory after everything Fillory had taken from him seemed unfathomable. He'd moved, and tried to slide towards the edge of the bed. One knee had buckled, and he'd gone to the ground, and Quentin had scrambled down to sit in front of him. His face had been pinched and pallid, which had made the circles under his eyes stand out. 

“I never wanted to hurt you!” The worst of it was that Eliot had believed him, and he'd let their eyes meet, their gazes held. 

“I only wanted to save you, because I knew I loved you, even after I lied about it. I'd do it again. I wouldn't have let you trap yourself in that castle for an eternity.” Quentin's hand had cupped his face. 

“I love you too, El. God, I do. You don't know the lengths I went to, the things I did to get you back. It told me you were dead, and at the last second you broke through.”

“What did you think it meant?” Eliot couldn't say why he had been punishing himself. “Peaches, and plums, and proof of concept? I got to be me for like six fucking seconds, and I tried to tell you I love you and that I was wrong.” Tears had spilled down both of their faces. Margo seemed to be keeping her distance. Maybe she had hoped that if she gave them space, they would find a way to get past everything. Eliot had wanted that too, but more than that he hadn't wanted to be second. It had been asking too much, but just once he wanted it all, and he had no one to blame but himself when he wouldn't get it. 

Instinctively he'd reached for the water taps of the bathroom adjacent to the bedroom. He'd heard them twist, and the water drum, but the amount of available magic had felt so wrong. 

“You're going to burn out all the ambient magic.” Margo had told him. “Don't waste what little we get on stupid shit.” She'd rounded the bed and heaved his arm over her shoulder, with Quentin's help Eliot had stood, and he'd sunk into the water after he'd struggled free from the ruined clothes. Eliot had felt like he was out of his depth, literally and figuratively. His body was wrecked, and his mind was months out of time. 

“You can go, Q.” He'd whispered as he ran his hands through his unkempt hair. It had been so long, tangible proof of how long he'd been trapped and used. 

“I want... El I want to be here!” 

“And I want that too, but don't want your girlfriend sneering at the back of my head every time you touch me!” Eliot had felt like he'd been reduced to all raw edges and anger, anger that generated from the deep well of self-hate he'd managed to cap during his brief time as king. 

“Alice understands.” 

“Does she?” Eliot had splashed his hand aimlessly at the water, skipping the back of it along at uneven intervals and breaking the surface tension. “Did you tell her about the mosaic? About Arielle, and Teddy, and us? Did you tell her you asked me to date you and I turned you down? I was scared, Quentin! Of my feelings, of being happy and having it taken away. My lovers don't pick me and stay, Q! Did you tell her? Did you?” 

“No...” Tears had streaked down Quentin's face as he knelt by the side of the tub. 

“Then she doesn't understand.” Eliot had tried to gentle his tone. “She has no way of understanding.” 

“I don't want to hurt either of you!” That was Quentin in a nutshell, always the one to bend himself into a pretzel to compromise. Eliot had found it endearing during the mosaic, frustrating and charming and he'd accepted it because Quentin was his only link to the life he'd lost. Then, as much as he hated the truth of it, he'd needed more. 

“I'm wrecked, Q. I... I can't handle it.” The tub had been deep, and Eliot had rested his forehead against the lip of it. “I'm not mad at you, that isn't where all this anger is coming from. Eliot had said the words to the line where pale blue water had met off-white porcelain. “I'm mad at myself. I don't know what to do with how much of it there is.” 

\-------------------------

Six months later and he was still having trouble letting go of it. Distance had helped. The New York penthouse they had all been sharing had been suffocating. Every time Alice and Quentin had fought, he'd had to press down the soul-crushing hope that warred and with the glee that Alice and Quentin's relationship was as toxic as ever. He wanted Quentin to be happy, really he did, preferably with him, but for sure with anyone but Alice. 

He'd moved to Boston as soon as he'd found an apartment and a job, a pair of them, more accurately. The unfamiliar city was different than anything in his memories, and the newness of it helped ground him in reality. His afternoons were spent as a clerk at a wine shop, while his evenings and nights were spent bartending. The combination gave him just enough time to sleep, and almost no time to think. He and Margo did brunch every Sunday morning; sometimes Josh joined them. He'd barely spoken to Quentin but got regular updates on just how miserable he seemed to be from Margo. 

As he drug his feet in the direction of his apartment door, his only thought was sleep. It was the rare occurrence where he didn't have to work his afternoon shop shift, and he'd get to sleep almost the whole afternoon through to his bar shift. His hands flicked through the complicated series of wards, and he reached for the inner locks with his telekinesis, then stumbled through into the interior. 

He tugged the pair of dark-framed glasses off his face and rubbed at his temples. The possession had left its mark, and he'd found himself needing corrective lenses a lot sooner than he'd ever needed them in Fillory. Strangely it was a look he liked, perhaps because it helped differentiate memory from reality the same way an unfamiliar city did. His wardrobe choices since he'd moved helped define that line as well. Polo shirts, designer jeans, and button-down shirts had replaced the three-piece suits. He'd cut his hair to a length that was shorter than the monster's but longer than his neat grad school curls.

There are more lights on than he ever uses, and Alice is sitting on his couch. He puts his glasses back on as a bottle of whiskey flies to his hand, and he twists the cap without speaking to her. Alice's eyes drop to her lap, and she fidgets as Eliot drinks and waits her out. 

“Q. He, misses you, so much.” 

“Not my problem.” 

“Isn't it, though? He loves you, and you aren't even trying!” 

“It's not a competition, and he's not a prize.” Alice rocks a little in place, and Eliot wonders what big reveals she's trying to work toward. 

“My parents had multiple partners, a third, and I think a fourth too.” 

“Quentin told me something about that, some traveler who helped to get Penny back, right? And some woman you thought was a lamprey?” They had told each other everything to keep their memories of the home they had lost alive. 

“When did he, why would he tell you that?” 

“We had fifty years to kill, in Fillory, when that key dumped us in the past.” Eliot assumes by now that Quentin has told her, but Alice's eyes go wide like its the first she hears about fifty years of anything. Fuck Quentin, it had been his life too, and he was allowed to talk about it. According to the therapist Henry had arranged and who he sees once a week, anyway. “We had a third too, for the first five years or so. She died when our son was about four...” Eliot thinks that's right. It's all getting fuzzy around the edges. He doesn't like to think about it. “She was Quentin's wife, but we both loved her, even if she resented me...” Eliot swallows. “A lot more than she ever let Quentin see.” 

“We could do that, Eliot! Quentin would be so happy to have us both!” 

“Did you not just hear me? Arielle resented that there was a third. She was a class act and hid it, but I saw it. I don't want to do it again, to walk on eggshells hoping that today isn't the day when his wife decides that she can't hack it anymore. I don't want to play second chair violin again.” 

“You wouldn't be the second chair.” The admission comes with a sniff, and Alice's hands rub over the skirt that covers her thighs.” Eliot takes a swig from the bottle, then offers it to her. He's surprised when he accepts it and tips the glass against her lips. The lack of a grimace is probably proof of how much more she drinks now. 

“I love him, Alice, but I don't want there to be a second chair. If I'm playing I want it to be solo, the only one on stage, the grand movements of Vivaldi Summer III, Presto, Paganini – Caprice No. 24.” Alice looks stunned that he's deeper than the vapid party boy he'd played at Brakebills. Eliot blinks away tears. “A whole concerto, just for him.” He wipes his eyes and fixes his gaze on his knees. At some point, he'd dropped into the rarely used armchair. “I was so stupid when all of our memories came rushing back. Q wanted to jump right back into the pool, clothes and all. He knew we worked; we could have worked, but I let my fear ruin us.” He looks up to find her watching him. She's not talking, so he decides to keep filling the emptiness with words. “I don't know how you got him to forgive you...” A lump forms in his throat. “I was trapped in my memories the whole time. I couldn't see what that thing was doing. All I could do was relive my best and worst moments and promise myself that I'd tell Quentin I loved him if I ever got out. I promised a memory of him that I'd be brave, and I am. I told him, and it only hurt him. It hurt all of us, and now I'm trying to find where I fit in a world that has never worked for me.” The bottle comes back to his hand, but he doesn't take a sip, just stares down into it and inhales the scent. “I'm missing months of my life. There are details that Margo and Josh can't give me because they weren't there.” 

Alice sniffs, and it's not a derisive sound, maybe it's honest, but Eliot doesn't look at her face to read her expression. 

“I like Boston and my jobs; I want to start dating again. I want to find somebody that only has eyes for me. It's selfish, Alice. I know, it's selfish, but it's healthy too and I have to be brave and make choices that are right for me.” 

“What if I wasn't in the picture? What if I leave him and beg you to pick up the pieces?”

“Q doesn't deserve to have his choices invalidated when I don't know why he made them. For unfathomable reasons I can't imagine he chose you. He wants to be with you, even after everything you did and the way you treated him. It's toxic, but it's what he wants, and there's nothing wrong with wanting something bad for you. I left so you two could have space to be whatever it is you're supposed to be. I don't want him to be hurt anymore than he's already been hurt.” Would he pick up the pieces? In a heartbeat, but if he did, there would be no take-backs. Q would have to be his; Eliot can't handle the thought that he might go to all that effort to wind up with nothing. He's not stupid enough to think that there won't be rough patches and fights that will almost break them. To think that wouldn't be is delusional. He just doesn't want to look over his shoulder every day and see Alice playing second chair with the goal of first. 

“Getting you back was the only thing he cared about, even when protecting you put him at odds with Penny and Julia.” Eliot fidgets in his chair. He'd been given a brief rundown during their efforts to stop the library, but people had been treating him like glass, and it had only added to his desperation to get away as soon as the dust had settled. 

“I love him.” Eliot takes a swig of whiskey, then forces himself to lean forward and put the bottle down. “I don't think I deserve him, or his loyalty, after how badly I hurt him.” His fingers itch to reach for the bottle again. Beside him, Alice is standing. 

“I think he'll be happier with you than me.” Eliot shrugs, and the gesture feels hopeless. Alice can think whatever she wants, but in the end, it's really up to Quentin. Her hand cups his cheek and Eliot holds very still, then her fingers move away, and he slumps forward in the chair. “I think he gave us a shot again because you were possessed, and Julia was possessed, and he thought he was going to lose both of you forever. We're not working. We weren't working when we were all living together and since we've all split apart its only gotten worse.”

“I didn't try to ruin your relationship on purpose.” 

“I know.” Alice doesn't sound distressed like he expects, or angry, just resigned, maybe even a touch relieved that she now has a plan. 

“He and I are going to talk when I get home, and if he'd rather have you, I'll bow out.” Eliot swallows the protest that he deserves better than being someone's second choice. It's Quentin. If there's a chance, he's got to be brave enough to try and grab it. 

“He's always welcome here.” There's no chance of him moving back to New York. Putting his life back together has to be his focus. He's hopeful enough to want Quentin to be part of it, but brave enough to realize that he has to move on if he won't be.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm thinking of a sequel, but that will be determined by how well this is received. Comments and thoughts are appreciated!


End file.
